Since in a few weeks I will be retiring Experiments in Manga, this will be the final Bookshelf Overload posted here. However, I am thinking of ways that I might be able to feature some of the interesting media that I find by leveraging my Twitter account more effectively. As for the things that found their way into my home in November, I once again picked up more anime than I generally do. (Granted, two of those, Skip Beat! and Mind Game were the results of Kickstarters that I supported way back when.) November saw the release of several debuts that I was particularly excited about, including ACCA: 13-Territory Inspection Department, Volume 1 by Natsume Ono, Arakawa Under the Bridge, Omnibus 1 by Hikaru Nakamura, To Your Eternity, Volume 1 by Yoshitoki Oima (okay, technically it was released on the last day of October), as well as the Parasyte tribute anthology Neo-Parasyte M. I also recently discovered that a small publisher based out of Yokohama, Black Hook Press, is releasing gekiga manga in translation, such as Takashi Fukutani’s Dokudami Tenement. One more acquisition from November that I’d like to highlight is Denise Schroeder’s The Good Prince, Volume 1 which collects the first three chapters of that webcomic. My introduction to Schroeder’s work was through the utterly charming comic Before You Go, so I’m happy to get my hands on more of her work in print.

Another month, another mountain of media that somehow made its way into my possession! (Actually, I know exactly how.) Thanks to some fantastic sales, I finally got around to filling in the gaps in my collection of Takehiko Inoue’s Vagabond. I also ended up buying more anime than I usually do, too. In particular, Sentai Filmworks announced back in September that it would be discontinuing DVDs and has since been working to clear out stock. Since my eyesight is poor enough that I don’t usually notice a difference in visual quality between DVD and Blu-ray releases, I took the opportunity to pick up Space Brothers and a few other things at a greatly discounted price. As for October manga debuts, I was greatly impressed by Spirit Circle, Volume 1 by Satoshi Mizukami. I was also really looking forward to the release of Yokai Rental Shop, Volume 1 by Shin Mashiba since I enjoyed the creator’s earlier series Nightmare Inspector. Notably, manga translator and yokai scholar Zack Davisson released a new work in October, too–Kaibyo: The Supernatural Cats of Japan is one of the newest titles from Chin Music Press, a publisher that takes great care with physical production and design, so in addition to being interesting, it’s also a beautiful book.

Over the last few months my manga buying habits have been slowly changing. In general I’m preordering less (which is rather unfortunate as that’s one of the best ways to support the manga industry), opting to wait to catch up on series until there’s a good sale of some sort. And so, in August I ended up finally picking up more of Akane Shimizu’s delightfully entertaining and educational Cells at Work! and Haruichi Furudate’s upbeat sports manga Haikyu!! among other things. As for older series that are new to me, I discovered that Izumi Tsubaki’s Oresama Teacher has a mix of humor and heart that I find irresistible. However, there were a few August releases that I was particularly looking forward to, like Delicious in Dungeon, Volume 2 by Ryoko Kui, Otherworld Barbara, Omnibus 2 by Moto Hagio, and the comic Fantasy Sports, Volume 3 by Sam Bosma. I also decided to give the anime Rampo Kitan: Game of Laplace directed by Seiji Kishi a try, mostly because I came across a set for a great price and because I have an affinity for all things even tangentially related to Edogawa Rampo.

I ended up picking up a few more things than I had initially planned to in July (including more anime series than usual). Partly to blame was the huge month-long anniversary sale at RightStuf. Granted, some of the items that I ordered during the sale didn’t arrive until August, so they won’t be found in the list below. Also not represented (although perhaps they should be) are the books that I bought as replacements for some of the materials that I already owned but lost to water damage from a radiator leak last month. But as for the manga to arrive in July that do appear on the list below that I was especially happy to see, there was Kentaro Miura’s Berserk, Volume 38 (the previous volume was published in 2013),Shigeru Mizuki’s Kitaro and the Great Tanuki War (technically released in June), and Izumi Tsubaki’s Monthly Girls’ Nozaki-kun, Volume 8 (which continues to be a delight). I also finally got around to picking up Tetsu Kariya and Akira Hanasaki’s Oishinbo, A la Carte: Izakaya: Pub Food, the final volume of the series to be published in English. July had a fair number of interesting debuts in store for me, too, including Gou Tanabe’s H.P. Lovecraft’s The Hound and Other Stories (a nice addition to the horror manga available in translation), Yuki Fumino’s I Hear the Sunspot (a truly lovely manga), and Haruko Ichikawa’s Land of the Lustrous, Volume 1 (which, if nothing else, has stunning artwork).

After the ridiculousness of May’s Bookshelf Overload, the number of manga, comics, and other books that I picked up in June seems completely reasonable. But even though it was a small month, it was still a great month. First of all, one of the manga I was most looking forward to this year was released–Kabi Nagata’s My Lesbian Experience with Loneliness. (Although the work is more than deserving of it, I won’t be doing a formal, in-depth review, but I did write a Quick Take of it a few weeks ago.) I was also particularly excited for the debut of Satoru Noda’s Golden Kamuy and the continuation of Makoto Yukimura’s Vinland Saga in June. Hirohiko Araki’s Manga in Theory and Practice: The Craft of Creating Manga should also present an interesting read once I finally get the chance to get around to it. Currently, though, I’m reading Kazuki Sakuraba’s novel A Small Charred Face. It isn’t due to be released until September, but the folks at Haikasoru were kind enough to send me an advanced copy. I really enjoyed Sakuraba’s Red Girls: The Legend of the Akakuchibas and have been looking forward to the translation of A Small Charred Face for quite some time. So far, it’s been fantastic; look for a review to come soon!